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Our Favorite Author Interviews of 2017

One of the pleasures of working on To The Best Of Our Knowledge is finding the packages that arrive in the mail. Every day we get books from a wide array of publishers. Sometimes, there are just a few books — and other days, it’s like Christmas. Ten or even twenty books might land on a given day. We ask for certain books that we need to read so we can interview the author. But most books are sent unsolicited by publishers hoping that we’ll follow up with an interview.

In case it’s not obvious: we LOVE books on TTBOOK. But we’re also incredibly picky about which books we choose for interviews.

As we put together this list of our favorite books, we were even more selective. These are the best of the best — our favorite books of the year that turned into interviews. We have five producers on staff, and each of us picked just one book.

As you’ll see, it’s an eclectic mix: fiction and nonfiction, cultural criticism, politics and even a photography book about old movie palaces. Enjoy — and we hope you’ll listen to these interviews!

If climate change is the most urgent problem facing humanity, why are there so few novels about it? Acclaimed novelist Amitav Ghosh believes that’s a big problem. He says climate change is less a science problem than a crisis of imagination.

In collaboration with David Lynch, Mark Frost co-created one of the most enduring fictional universes of all time — Twin Peaks. Bookending the series' return to TV in 2017 after 25 years, Frost has written two innovative novels that take a deep dive into the history of the surreal logging town.

The young American soldiers who protected Saddam Hussein during his trial spent hours alone with the “Butcher of Baghdad” and unexpectedly grew to like him. They were devastated by his execution and its violent aftermath.